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Monthly Archives: June 2016

Did you know we have a cafe now? If you don’t you’re forgiven, because I haven’t written anything on this blog for six months, so. (Pal around with us on FB or IG or Twitter where we bug you with beautiful food pix every day, ok?). Um also did you know we (with our BFF Maresa, who also co-invented this recipe) have an NYC chocolate-macaron shop now? We still have our OG New Paltz choco-shop, it’s mostly a production space for shipping & the NYC shop & life is great & I work 24 hours a day and you should come visit our lil empire in NP, blah blah.

OK now that I’ve done my capitalist-promotion for the day, let’s talk eggs.

At Commissary! (aforementioned cafe) we serve ye olde Vegan Deviled Eggs every day (on our cheese plates obvi), so I’ve learned the ins & outs of ’em more, and that old post is such a mess that I figured I owed it to you to streamline it a bit.

Some updated notes:

The original recipe calls for unsweetened almond or soy milk. Almonds are naturally sweet and that sweetness can be off-putting, so I like a mix of 1/2 almond milk and 1/2 soy milk to cut the sweetness without that telltale thick beany soymilky flavor. But if you don’t want to buy a container of each, use either. I’ve also tried this recipe with homemade almond milk—in my opinion it’s too sweet. Don’t get too precious.

If it’s your first time making these babes, read the original post for good tips for using agar and black salt for the first time and where to buy an egg mold.

You might want to halve the whites recipe and make it twice unless you have a lot of egg molds, because it’ll set up fairly fast. Agar is thermoreversible (ooh la la), however, so if it sets up you can gently reheat it & it’ll melt back down. In my opinion it always gets too frothy when you do this, though.

Speaking of frothiness—it’s really your enemy. It doesn’t give you a good texture, and it’s a dead giveaway that you’re eating a fake egg. To cut down on froth, barely whisk or stir the mixture as it’s coming to a boil, and tap it hard on a wooden cutting board before you pour the whites into the egg molds, and scoop off any froth and throw it away. If you still have bubbles when you’ve poured the mixture into the molds, poke them with a knife blade.

If you’re too lazy to do the whole eggs thing or don’t want to buy an egg mold just for this recipe, just chop up the whites (spread them on a sheet pan or something instead of pouring into the eggs molds) and mix em with the yolks and make egg salad.

Be sure your black salt is the sulfurous, eggy kind, kala namak. We use a black lava sea salt on a chocolate and always have to be careful not to mess em up. The egginess of kala namak varies widely, so buy a small jar. It also loses its potency quickly, so buy a small jar. We taste our eggs every day and typically have to give them a small sprinkle of salt every morning to top up the egg flavor.

The big difference between this recipe and the first version is that Rachel, who works at Commissary! had the brilliant idea to blend the scooped-out insides of the whites into the yolks mixture—it helps the mixture hold its shape and gives it a little more flavor. The original recipe had vegan mayo, but with the scooped out whites you don’t need it—I upped the vinegar & mustard quantities slightly, too.

I just bought these egg molds, they’re nice, though slightly bigger than regular chicken eggs.

If you’re wondering why two hardcore vegans (Maresa & I have been vegan combined literally 40 years or more) would make these, here’s what Reesey had to say about it way back when we created em: “I usually hate stuff like this. We did it for a few reasons: 1. the fun challenge of nailing a taste and texture that are decidedly Not Vegan. 2. Deviled eggs, to me, taste good. I’m not vegan because meat and dairy and eggs taste bad- I’m vegan because those industries are too effed up to support. 3. Nostalgia. My grandma used to make deviled eggs and now she can’t, so someone’s gotta do it, and I’m not going to touch a chicken’s period. That said, Enjoy!”

Let set up 15 minutes or so, in the fridge or not, then scoop out the center cavity with a melon baller, grapefruit spoon, or whatever. The beauty of making your own egg whites is that in addition to not supporting the machine of institutionalized death and heartbreaking pain that is the egg industry, you also get to make your cavities as big as you want (make them big), so you can put in as much filling as you want (put in a lot). As with non-vegan deviled eggs, the filling is the tasty part.

THE YOLKS

1 lb firm or extra firm tofu

1/3 cup olive oil

1 tablespoon mustard

1 tablespoon white wine vinegar (or whatever vinegar you want)

1 1/4 teaspoon black salt, or to taste

1 teaspoon turmeric

scooped out innards from the whites

Blend all together in food processor or blender. Taste and keep messing around until it tastes good.

Using a pastry bag fitted with an open star tip, pipe the yolks into the whites in a circular motion.

Garnish with a sprinkle of paprika, chives, basil in the garden gone to flower—whatever suits your fancy.